I had to file an extension for the first time and found the process quite confusing - thanks everyone for your help so I thought I would summarize for anyone else, especially the state part which was not Intuit-ive (pun intended😉)
- First and probably most important for me, you really can't complete the process all in one day, especially if it's the deadline day. Because your federal extension has to be done first, then it is formally "filed" and finally, "approved." For me, it took 7 hours from when you hit the Extend button on TT to be formally Filed and then another 2 hours to be Approved. Until the Approved step, you can't go to step 2, or at least I couldn't
- Surprisingly, after you extend for federal, it doesn't auto-extend for state. You have to do it for each state. And even more surprising, hitting the extend button is NOT at the State Review state but the step prior during the interview part. And the extend option did NOT show up until after Federal was Approved.
- Be aware, even though I had received a federal extension, TT was about to let me file anyway! When I logged back in after getting the Approval, it walked me through to the File option. I thought (incorrectly) an extend option would come afterwards. Thankfully I stopped due to posting from here. And for me, the "extend" button shows up immediately when I restarted the state interview part (the very first screen) while for others, it was at the end of the interview part. Unnecessarily confusing IMO.
- For CT, TT only provided a mail option as there was no e-option, including the payment that I owed which TT said I had to mail in by check. But the state itself allowed me to e-extend on their website and pay online. NY required that I e-extend only through whoever had filed the federal extension so no option to e-extend except through TT. Again, surprised this wasn't disclosed anywhere.
- Of course, and as was pointed out repeatedly for good reason, extending does not prevent you from paying what is owed by 4/15/24. In my case, I paid my federal through TT and paid my CT through the CT website, even though TT said I had to mail it in.
See this section for more details (on my struggles): File an extension
Hope it's helpful!
